KHARTOUM, Oct 9 (Reuters) - South Sudan's president asked U.N. Security Council envoys to deploy peacekeepers along the country's north-south border ahead of a referendum on southern independence, diplomats said on Saturday.
Sudan is three months away from a vote on whether to declare independence or stay united with the north, its foe in decades of civil war that ended in a 2005 peace deal.
News of the request from southern president Salva Kiir came amid growing tensions along the ill-defined border. Both northern and southern leaders have accused each other of building up troops there.
It was likely to anger northern leaders who want to keep Africa's largest country united and have accused Western governments of covertly backing southern separation.
The U.N. ambassadors agreed to consider the request made by Kiir at a meeting in the southern capital Juba on Wednesday, two diplomats with a visiting Security Council delegation told Reuters. (Reporting by Louis Charbonneau; writing by Andrew Heavens; Editing by Charles Dick)
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